News & Announcements
Why You Should Attend the Sleep Conference this Year
By: By Patrick Moday, BBA, RPSGT, RST, CCSH I started working in sleep clinical research while in college and would attend pharmaceutical conferences every 3-4 months. The meetings were about pharmaceutical medications for sleep-related conditions. There were cool...
A Brief Overview on Sleep Health and Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome
By: Robyn Woidtke, RN, RPSGT Why should we care about and recognize polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS) in sleep health? This “very” brief overview is aimed to answer some of those questions. Additionally, an objective would be to create an interest in reaching out...
Irregular Sleep Pattern and Mood
By: Joshua Roland, MD, FAASM It is fairly intuitive that mood and sleep have a bidirectional relationship. When we sleep poorly, we are more likely to not be in our best disposition and have a compromised emotional threshold the following day. We also know anxiety,...
A Sleep Tech’s Firsthand Experience with COVID
By: Edwin M. Valladares, MS, RPSGT, Manager, USC Sleep Disorders Center COVID-19 is an elusive buggee monster until it hits home. At the beginning of 2021 I contracted COVID-19. One day I felt like my lungs were slightly inflamed, like getting dust in your lungs and...
The President’s Corner
By: Rafael Pelayo, MD, FAASM Dear California Sleep Society, I hope you are as safe and healthy as possible during this time. It has become routine for the sleep professionals in our state to see patients via Zoom and to wear full PPE when working with patients in the...
The AHI Challenge
By: Robyn Woidtke, MSN, RN, RPSGT, CCSH In 2017, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force stated that screening for sleep apnea is not recommended in symptomatic adults, including those with unrecognized symptom[1]. This is an interesting conundrum as many individuals...
The Year 2020, Social Determinants of Health Amplified: Sleep Disparities
By: Robyn Woidtke, MSN, RN, RPSGT, CCSH The country is in the midst of the worst public health crisis most of us have experienced. The health disparities which existed prior to COVID-19 have only been exacerbated by the virus. The National Institutes of Health have...
Taping Your Mouth Closed During Sleep; Is that a Good Idea?
By: William T. Hart, MD Many products are being sold over the counter and are promoted to improve sleep. Recently I have noticed peddling of misinformation and potentially ineffective therapies are common on the internet. One of these is selling mouth tape for...
Light Therapy
By: Patrick Moday, BBA, RPSGT, RST, CCSH “Light is to darkness what love is to fear; in the presence of one, the other disappears.” Marianne Williamson, A Year of Miracles: Daily Devotions and Reflections. Light therapy (aka phototherapy and heliotherapy) is used to...
The Pandemic of Sedentariness
By: Emmanuel During, MD We will all remember the year 2020. A tragic year of confinement, emotional and financial strain across the society and across the globe. It seems that a lot can be said about this, but not much can be done, except for physically distancing,...
Remote Patient Monitoring (RPM) and Remote Therapeutic Monitoring (RTM): Where Are We Today?
By: Robyn Woidtke, MSN-Ed, RN, RPSGT, CCSH, FAAST CAVEAT: I AM NOT A REIMBURSEMENT; LEGAL OR CMS EXPERT In 2021, partially in response to the Covid pandemic, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid (CMS) provided an update for the use of remote and therapeutic patient...
Polysomnographic Technologist – Lead
Polysomnographic Technologist - Lead At Scripps Health, you will experience the pride, support, respect that has been repeatedly recognized as one of the nation’s Top 100 Places to Work. You’ll be surrounded by people committed to making a difference in the lives of...
Polysomnographic Technologist – NIGHT
Polysomnographic Technologist - NIGHT At Scripps Health, you will experience the pride, support, respect that has been repeatedly recognized as one of the nation’s Top 100 Places to Work. You’ll be surrounded by people committed to making a difference in the lives of...
Polysomnographic Technologist – Day
Polysomnographic Technologist - Day At Scripps Health, you will experience the pride, support, respect that has been repeatedly recognized as one of the nation’s Top 100 Places to Work. You’ll be surrounded by people committed to making a difference in the lives of...
Mild Sleep Apnea & Excessive Sleepiness
By: Sam Kashani, MD The severity of sleep apnea is determined on a sleep study and is typically based on the number of respiratory pauses/disruptions per hour of sleep, which is generally reflected by the RDI, or respiratory disturbance index. Keeping in mind that a...
“Summer’s Here and the Time is Right for Dancing in the Street”
By: Rafael Pelayo, MD I hope all of you are in full swing enjoying the 2022 summer. It has been strange for many of us to start interacting again with each other in person. For those of us in the healthcare field, we are in a hybrid situation of keeping the strict...
What Do Video Games Tell Us About Sleep?
By: Eric Young, RPSGT Exiting the pandemic, there’s been an increase in electronic media consumption. More people are on TikTok, connecting through Facebook, and, of course, playing video games. A 2019 survey[1] by CommonSenseMedia.org showed 56% of 13 to...
Why Sacramento?
By: Rafael Pelayo, MD “Why not?” is the simplest answer. For years, many California Sleep Society (CSS) members, have wanted our annual meeting be in Sacramento. We will hold our first meeting there at the end of September. It does take a lot of time to...
Guardrails
By: Rafael Pelayo, MD What did Jerry Garcia and Antonin Scalia likely have most in common? How they slept. About a third of their time they shared the same condition millions of others do. Their deaths were related to obstructive sleep apnea. Jerry Garcia did not...
The Occasional Rough Night
By: Sam A. Kashani, MD One of my favorite questions I am frequently asked by people is “what do you recommend I do if I’m just having a bad night?“ More specifically, I often encounter a solid sleeper who doesn’t necessarily have a chronic sleep difficulty but just...